0:01

Hab and Spoke. Audio

0:04

Collective. The

0:08

French version of America's Got

0:10

Talent is called La France

0:12

a un incroyable talent. France

0:15

has an unbelievable talent. Similar

0:18

title, similar format. Performers,

0:20

live audience, and

0:22

a panel of judges, which includes

0:24

an entertainment industry insider, a singer

0:27

or two, and a

0:29

comedian Someone who dishes out

0:31

monstrous insults, but gets away

0:33

with it, usually, because

0:35

they're funny and charming. In

0:38

this French show, that comedian is

0:41

Samir Kula, and he doesn't

0:43

hold back. He

0:51

tells this Swiss singer. I know we all know

0:53

Switzerland as a neutral country, but this is a

0:55

declaration of war. We

0:58

all know Switzerland is a neutral

1:00

country, but that was a declaration

1:02

of war. And

1:06

he asked this singer, who's fully grown, looks like he's

1:08

in his late 20s. Do you still live

1:10

at home with your parents? Yes, I knew that. Do

1:13

you still live at home with your parents? Yes,

1:15

says the singer. Yeah, I know, says

1:17

Samir. Samir

1:21

Kula has been a repeat judge on the

1:23

show. He's been on for six seasons now.

1:25

French audiences love him. But

1:28

he's not French. He is

1:30

Canadian, from Quebec, best known

1:32

as a stand-up comedian. He's

1:34

a star in several countries, in several languages.

1:38

Please welcome back, comedian, TV personality,

1:40

a man of many talents, and

1:42

the sweetest guy in comedy, Sugar

1:44

Sammy! From Quiet Juice and

1:46

the Linguistic Society of America, this is Subtitle. Stories

1:50

about languages and the people who speak

1:52

them. Today, a conversation about the languages

1:54

that Sugar Sammy speaks. outcry,

4:00

cue resignation of the director

4:03

of the office québécoire

4:05

de la l'enfoncères, cue mockery

4:07

directed at overzealous bureaucrats, and

4:10

cue a new gate word, pasta

4:13

gate. For Sugar Samy,

4:15

pasta gate was irresistible. In the

4:17

wake of it, he appeared at

4:20

an award ceremony on one of

4:22

Quebec's French-language channels. He was one

4:24

of the people announcing the nominations,

4:27

together with none other than the

4:29

then-premier of the province of Quebec,

4:31

Pauline Marois. She's a Quebec nationalist,

4:34

a strong supporter of French language

4:36

protections. Up on stage

4:38

on live TV, Sugar Samy

4:40

wasn't going to let that pass

4:43

without doing some simultaneous translation into

4:45

English. Then, as he looks at the

4:47

premiere, he translates those words

4:49

into French. And

4:58

she plays along, in English, then in French.

5:07

That appearance won Sugar Samy a load

5:09

of new fans among both French and

5:11

English speakers in Quebec. And

5:13

pretty soon, he was performing four

5:15

different types of stand-up. A

5:17

show in French, one in English, he

5:20

calls that the illegal English edition. He

5:23

also had a spin-off of the English

5:25

show called the Indian edition. That's mainly

5:27

English, but there's also some Hindi and

5:29

Punjabi thrown in, and some French. And

5:32

then there's the version of a show

5:34

that I think he's most proud of.

5:36

It's called Jorgenne Rie. Rie, if only

5:39

I could pronounce it correctly, means laugh.

5:41

It's a bilingual 50-50 French

5:43

and English stand-up. People at the

5:46

time told Sugar Samy that that

5:48

linguistic format would never succeed, that

5:51

he had to pick either French or English, but

5:53

not do both at the same time. It

5:56

turned out to be a huge success, and

5:58

he's still doing it. Sugarsamy

6:01

was born in Montreal to parents

6:03

who'd immigrated from India. He told

6:05

me that at home and especially

6:07

at school, he'd always played the

6:10

funny, rebellious guy. I'd

6:12

host all the talent shows at school, and when

6:14

we'd have school trips, the teachers would let me go

6:16

to the front of the bus to entertain the

6:18

kids. I would host those shows in French, but I'd

6:20

do probably my entertaining in English, you know, whenever I

6:22

could. I could try to get away with it,

6:24

just because I went to French school and it was

6:27

pretty much the rules that you'd have to do everything

6:29

in French. But you would constantly want

6:31

to flip back to English? Mm-hmm, just because it

6:33

wasn't allowed, you know. As soon as you're not

6:35

allowed as a kid, you want to do it.

6:37

I guess that's what would become as an adult

6:39

as well, you know. Whenever people tell you, you

6:42

can't really talk about it, you can't do it in this

6:44

language, or you can't do a bilingual show, I always feel

6:46

like, well, why not? Well, tell me a

6:48

little bit about the bilingual show, because that was

6:50

based on people telling you what, you wouldn't be able

6:52

to sell it out? Well, not just sell it out,

6:54

but I couldn't pull it out. You wouldn't be able

6:57

to pull it off in Montreal, because, you know, everybody

6:59

thinks there are two solitudes, which to

7:01

a certain extent there are. Explain

7:03

two solitudes to our American audience.

7:06

Well, to an American audience, basically,

7:08

Quebec is a province inside of Canada.

7:11

Canada is the country to the north of you. And

7:15

in that province- Well, that's where the comedians

7:17

come from, right? In

7:19

the two languages, we speak two languages in

7:21

Quebec. I mean, we officially one language, which

7:24

is French. But in

7:26

Montreal in particular, there's a big Anglophone

7:28

and bilingual constituency. And then it was

7:30

for years thought that Anglophones don't really

7:33

watch anything that's French culture and vice

7:35

versa, which to a certain extent was

7:37

true, but I knew there was a

7:40

demographic in Montreal that did consume

7:42

in both languages. And

7:44

for years, people thought there's no way. There are TV

7:46

shows for the French, there are radio stations for the

7:48

French, there's a star system for the French, and there's

7:50

the same thing for the English. So there's no way

7:53

you'll pull it off. And I always

7:55

thought other people that I know who are like

7:57

me, who are able to function in both languages

7:59

and live in- in French and English on a daily

8:01

basis without even thinking about it. So I decided to

8:03

put the show together and try to mix both sides.

8:05

He mixed the French and the English and he got

8:08

a great hit. It worked. It worked out and I

8:10

was happy it did. Ça va? Ça

8:13

va. What's your name, brother? Jean

8:15

Sebastian. Jean Sebastian. You took two names. I'm

8:17

going to take two. Jean Sebastian, what do you do, brother? I

8:19

talk to you very good. Talk to you very good. I love how

8:21

I asked you in English. You're like, I'm going to answer in French.

8:23

I'm going to answer in French. I'm going to answer in French. I'm

8:25

going to answer in French. I'm going to answer in French. I'm going

8:27

to answer in French. I

8:31

had a feeling that there were plenty of people who

8:34

wanted to hang out in

8:36

the same room with people from the other side

8:38

of the tracks and enjoy something for once. You

8:41

speak to me in English. I answer you in French. I don't

8:43

care which country you're in. Guess the Florida. I

8:45

get a little sir. What's

8:48

your business here, Baj? The

8:51

East, the Sunday, Baccant? What

8:54

the hell is this guy talking about? It

8:58

was funny. It became a party

9:01

of different cultures and different languages

9:03

coming together. Yeah, absolutely. The idea

9:05

that it should be done across

9:08

the two linguistic solitudes is quite

9:10

meaningful, especially at a time when

9:12

the language tensions have risen again

9:15

in recent months. The

9:18

best thing you could do is make fun of it. The

9:20

whole pastigate thing has taken it to another

9:22

level internationally, for instance, as well. We

9:25

were on CNN when we were on BBC

9:27

and people were talking about pastigating. I

9:30

wasn't too sure how we were seeing. I thought I might

9:32

as well make a couple of jokes. I had a

9:34

tweet about it the other day as well where I

9:36

said, listen, I'm at a restaurant in downtown. Does anybody

9:38

know the French word for macaroni? It's

9:40

macaroni. I think it's

9:42

almost like the elephant in the room.

9:44

You got to talk about it as soon as you

9:47

can because as soon as you do, you liberate everybody

9:49

else. You just want that freedom

9:51

of laughing about the things that

9:53

bother us, that are easy. I

9:55

think it's therapeutic for all of

9:57

us, including the comedian. If

10:00

you can make people laugh about it, then it's

10:02

sort of therapy for you as well. Just

10:08

a quick interruption here to tell you

10:10

about the subtitle newsletter. Did you know

10:12

that we'll pop something into your inbox

10:14

if you sign up every two or

10:17

three weeks? It's a quick and fun

10:19

read. There's language-themed stories that are in

10:21

the news. You'll see what's coming up

10:24

in future podcasts. You'll hear about other

10:26

podcasts that we're listening to and we

10:28

think you'll like. And there's some goofy

10:30

lingo stuff as well. You can sign

10:33

up at subtitlepod.com/newsletter. subtitlepod.com/

10:38

newsletter. Well,

10:42

as you miss you, Sugar Sammy! Woo!

10:45

Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo!

10:48

Sugar Sammy has brought his stand-up show, sometimes

10:50

the French one, but usually the English one.

10:52

He's brought it to more than 40 countries,

10:55

including the land of his parents'

10:58

birth, India. I

11:00

asked him about his Indian-Canadian background.

11:03

Does his ethnicity make it easier

11:05

for him, more acceptable to poke

11:07

fun at his fellow Canadians, especially

11:09

the white ones? Well, I think

11:12

the key to it, I mean, it's not just being

11:15

a visible minority. That doesn't

11:17

give you license to get away

11:19

with everything. I think the key is

11:21

you've gotta make sure that when you

11:23

talk about something that you have inside

11:25

knowledge. You know, you gotta be an

11:27

expert about it. You gotta be an insider, meaning

11:29

when I talk about these cultures, when I talk about these languages,

11:32

when I talk about these situations, I've actually

11:34

lived them. I've actually been a part of

11:36

them. So your target, you nail that down

11:39

and then people connect with it and people

11:41

who are involved that you're talking about realize

11:43

that you did live this experience and

11:45

you do have a friend that you

11:47

hung out with or you did go out with

11:49

a girl who was French because we can tell

11:51

with the situation that you're bringing. When

11:54

it's just a generalization, well, then you're making

11:56

caricatures on stage and that's when it gets

11:58

offensive and that's when you. you can't get

12:00

away with it. Whether you're white or black or a visible

12:04

minority or not, on

12:06

stage you've got to be very specific and you've got

12:08

to have done your research. And your research has to

12:10

be you have to live those moments and talk about

12:12

those. And when it's authentic and genuine people could tell.

12:15

Okay so you're doing French, you're

12:17

doing English and now also Punjabi

12:20

and Hindi. I mean like that's you

12:22

must get different audience responses among your

12:24

different audiences and I wonder if that

12:26

sort of affects how

12:28

you deliver your lines and the

12:31

nature of the comedy itself. Well

12:33

I think for me the language

12:35

is just a means of communication.

12:37

The adjustment happens culturally meaning

12:39

that if I go into India I'll

12:42

adjust my act in terms of giving

12:44

them a real point of view of

12:47

well I'm an Indian from North America

12:50

here's what I see. This is how I

12:52

see India and that's how I would approach

12:54

it. And this is the India I was

12:56

sold by my parents and it's completely different

12:58

now and I have to go

13:00

tell my parents that they made a big mistake.

13:02

That it's no longer that pure India that they

13:04

thought it was. So that's that's kind of the

13:07

angle. You have to find okay well what's my

13:09

point of view with this culture. So when I

13:11

go into let's say the smaller towns in Quebec

13:13

I'm a big city Montrealer. Well that's the point

13:15

of view I come in with. I go well

13:17

look I'm from the big city here's

13:19

what I see walking into your town

13:22

and this is how I feel right now. So as soon

13:24

as you put that out on the table I

13:26

think they go all right he's authentic he's

13:28

genuine he's told us exactly he's not just coming here

13:31

to pander you know he's here to tell us. I

13:33

actually make fun of it. I go listen I know

13:35

it's a small town just wondering is this the town

13:37

I'm kind of a town where you got like a

13:39

sheriff and a deputy you know like you know

13:41

just asking those kind of questions on

13:43

stage makes them go okay it's a big city kid

13:45

who's a little bit lost let's

13:47

help him out and let's have fun with him tonight and

13:50

that's it you just got to adjust that way. So your

13:52

humor always adjusts to

13:54

different situations and different demographics

13:57

but linguistically everybody loves to laugh and the

13:59

street. structure of stand-up will stay the same.

14:02

That's very interesting. You

14:04

hear so often of people who maybe

14:06

not stand-up. I don't know of other people

14:08

who do stand-up in different languages, but certainly

14:11

people who write, people who communicate in one

14:13

form or another do find

14:15

that they do adjust. This is certainly

14:17

among many bilingual people. There's the perception

14:19

at least that they think differently, even

14:22

if linguists tell us that they don't,

14:25

from one language to another. The

14:27

thing with me is that because all of

14:29

these languages, I basically learned

14:31

them simultaneously, it

14:33

doesn't change the nature of who I am. When

14:36

I write in these languages, I still have that

14:38

point of view, which is Sam

14:40

Kular, growing up, a

14:42

Montrealer, a Canadian who grew up

14:44

speaking Hindi, Punjabi, English, and French

14:47

at the same time. When

14:49

I write, it's still me. If I

14:51

had to write in Spanish and I had to learn

14:53

Spanish, well then I'd probably have a lot of work

14:55

to do because it's a language I'm not used to,

14:57

it's a culture I'm not used to. Then

15:00

I'd say, okay, here we go. Now I've got

15:02

to make a big adjustment. Because I grew up

15:04

speaking those four languages naturally and they were part

15:06

of my development process as a kid, I

15:09

feel like they're just second nature. It's

15:11

almost shorthand now. Tell

15:14

us about the four shows in

15:16

Four Nights, all linguistically different from

15:18

one another that you're doing later

15:20

on this month. Yeah. I

15:22

felt like my workload wasn't big enough already. I

15:25

thought that I'd do four nights.

15:28

I was already doing the bilingual show and

15:30

the French show here in Quebec anyways, so

15:32

we put those back on sale for that

15:34

week and it was great. Then I knew

15:36

there was a small constituency of anglophones

15:39

who didn't speak any French and

15:42

who wanted to come to the shows and

15:44

said, listen, I don't speak any French, I don't understand

15:46

any French. It's a very small percentage. Is

15:48

it going to be a 100% English show? So

15:51

I said, okay, I'll do one one

15:53

night and sold out within a week

15:55

or something. It

15:57

was one of the quick ones to go. So we're doing that

15:59

for the... the Unilingual Anglophones. We

16:02

got one for the Unilingual Francophones, a

16:04

bilingual one, and of course now one

16:07

for the Indian population in Montreal who

16:09

speaks English, French, Indian Punjabi, so

16:11

we'll do something fun for them as well. So it'll

16:13

be a good little... So on that

16:15

one, are you actually going to flip between four different

16:18

languages? Yeah. I mean, it'll be all organic like I

16:20

did with the bilingual show. It'll just flow from one

16:22

to the other, and I'll have

16:24

specific material for the Indians here. Tell

16:27

me a little bit about that kind of material. I

16:29

mean, what is specific to the

16:32

Indian experience of Quebec that is

16:34

maybe different from other parts of

16:36

North America? Well, first of all,

16:38

it's seeing things that you

16:40

don't see anywhere else. You'll see a Sikh

16:42

Punjabi guy in Montreal speaking

16:45

French to another Sikh Punjabi guy from

16:47

across the street and yelling things out

16:49

in Québécois French to each other. Only

16:52

in Quebec would you see that. So

16:54

that situation makes for great comedy. Also,

16:57

probably the most metrosexual Sikhs I've ever

16:59

seen in my life are

17:02

living in Montreal right now, dressed to the

17:04

tee. Everything

17:06

matches. They've got velvet blazers.

17:09

They've got a diesel turbine.

17:11

You're like, okay, I've got

17:13

to talk about this. So

17:16

there you go. Just those experiences, having

17:18

that and pointing that out, I

17:20

think, is definitely something

17:23

that audiences here appreciate. When

17:27

you do a show in the United States, what

17:29

do you tell them about where you come

17:31

from? Well, I make fun of them a

17:34

lot as well. I talk

17:36

about being the Canadian neighbor, and then the

17:38

way I see the US and we see

17:40

America. So you'll

17:42

get that right away. I

17:45

talk about a bunch of

17:47

things, like the food, the

17:49

experience, the over-the-top patriotism. So

17:51

they're obsessed with hip-hop, which

17:53

Canadians kind of are

17:56

okay with. It's not what we love.

18:00

the hip-hop culture and their TV shows. So I

18:02

kind of, you know, everywhere I go, I always

18:04

bring my unique point of view and say, okay,

18:06

well this is where I'm from and this is

18:09

what I see, you know? And

18:11

I think that's what people like. They like that

18:13

observation. You know, a lot of times

18:15

you'll go into a place and people say, wow, you've

18:17

pointed out stuff that's been around for decades and we

18:19

haven't even noticed because it's become like wallpaper, you

18:22

know? But you actually see it because that's what it is. You see

18:24

it because you've never seen it for the first time. I've never seen

18:26

it, so I see it for the first time. What's

18:29

wallpaper to some people becomes a

18:31

foreground to someone who sees it for the

18:33

first time. Sugar

18:39

Sammy, perhaps coming to a city near you.

18:41

If you go to his website, which I'll

18:43

post in the show notes, you can see

18:45

where he'll be touring. He'll be in various

18:48

US cities pretty much throughout 2024. And

18:51

he has more dates booked right into 2025.

18:54

That's so far into the future. It's

18:57

like sci-fi. Thanks

19:00

to Alison Shaw, who writes

19:02

Subtitle's newsletter and manages our

19:04

social media accounts. Thanks also

19:06

to Jackie Mao and to

19:08

the gatekeeper of Studio NOLA.

19:11

And thanks to you, listener. If you

19:13

have the inclination, please leave us a

19:16

review wherever you listen. Subtitle

19:23

is a member of the Hub and Spoke

19:25

Audio Collective. It's worth checking out all of

19:27

the Hub and Spoke podcasts. Here's one of

19:29

them, Rumble Strip, which

19:31

tells extraordinary stories about ordinary

19:34

people. Or in the words of

19:36

its host, Erica Heilman, good conversation

19:38

that takes its time. The episode

19:41

to start with is probably Finn

19:43

and the Bell. I haven't heard

19:45

a heartbreaking story like this told

19:47

so movingly and so respectfully. It

19:50

won a Peabody Award, no less.

19:53

For more about Rumble Strip

19:55

and all of the Hub

19:57

and Spoke podcasts, go to

19:59

hubspokeaudio.com. That's

20:01

it for this time. Thanks for listening. We'll

20:03

be back sometime in January. Not

20:06

quite sure when. Happy New Year. Had

20:10

and Spoke. Audio

20:12

Collective.